Emmanuel Macron should not give in to the strikers paralysing Paris

TO HOLIDAYMAKERS, Paris seems pleasantly uncrowded at the moment, so long as they have stout boots to walk around in. The French capital is quiet because strikers have virtually shut it down. Few commuter trains are running and the Metro is mostly out of commission outside peak hours—except for the automated No 1 and No 14 lines. Commuters are staying at home, as are shoppers. A stoppage called by transport workers is entering its second month. It has now lasted longer than the strike in 1995 that scuppered pension reforms proposed by the then prime minister, Alain Juppé. As the holiday season ends and Parisians desperately need to get to work, the strikers are hoping that President Emmanuel Macron will surrender, like his predecessors. He should not.

This round of strikes is aimed at the third and final plank in Mr Macron’s ambitious overhaul of his country. The first plank was labour-market reform. This was also met by a wave of strikes, but they quickly fizzled out. The second plank, reforms to the systems for education and training, was less controversial, and not seriously opposed. Both of these changes will stand France in good stead. The employment reforms put a cap on previously unlimited awards for unfair dismissal, make it easier to shed unneeded workers and also easier to set up new businesses. They already seem to be bearing fruit, with job- and enterprise-creation both on the increase. The education reforms will take longer to prove themselves. The third plank is pension reform, and it is proving by far the most tricky (see article).